


The Truest Test is When We Cannot See

by shealynn88



Category: Supernatural
Genre: AND THERE WAS ONLY ONE BED!, Angst, Happy Ending, Hopeful Ending, Injured Sam Winchester, M/M, Multi, Politician Castiel (Supernatural), Polyamory, Sober Dean Winchester, Threesome - M/M/M, criminal winchester family, more relationship than plot
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-13
Updated: 2020-08-28
Packaged: 2021-03-05 20:54:16
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 11,677
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25871674
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/shealynn88/pseuds/shealynn88
Summary: Cas and Dean have a happy, quiet life in suburbia.  They've worked through a lot together, they've come a long way...and then Sam shows up on their doorstep.Dean is moody again.  Closed off.  Cas doesn't doubt what he and Dean have, but the way Dean watches Sam makes him uneasy.  A change is coming.  He can feel it.Even harder is that Sam is a good guy.  He's easy to talk to, grateful, full of admiration and an easy humor.  In different circumstances, they could be easy friends. Or more...
Relationships: Castiel/Dean Winchester, Castiel/Dean Winchester/Sam Winchester
Comments: 56
Kudos: 100
Collections: The AO3 SPN Kink Meme





	1. One

**Author's Note:**

  * In response to a prompt by Anonymous in the [theao3spnkinkmeme](https://archiveofourown.org/collections/theao3spnkinkmeme) collection. 



> **Prompt:**
> 
> Dean and Cas are a happy couple: successful, well-respected in the community, adorably in love. But Dean doesn't talk much of his family. He left them in the shadows for the light, he keeps saying, and Cas doesn't press. All that matters is what they have here and now … until Dean's baby brother shows up on their doorstep. And he ain't no baby.
> 
> Sam's in no shape to be turned away, and as they reunite, Cas gleans a history of crime, of secrets, of thrill and danger and loyalty that transcends reason and logic. And in spite of himself, Cas is morbidly curious. The envy and need he feels when he sees Dean with Sam, even though he knows Dean is undoubtedly faithful, piques something deep in Cas' belly.
> 
> They've been so comfortable, he and Dean. Crafting this beautiful life. This safe life. But that flicker in Dean's eye when he looks at his brother, Cas has never seen before. And Cas begins to wonder: What _if_...?
> 
> (Wincestiel, WinCasWin, either/or! I also don't care who tops or bottoms, if it gets that far. I like complicated feeeeeels. No excretory kinks or A/B/O, is all I ask, thank ya!)

Cas gets home just ahead of the storm, rain pelting the windows as he rushes inside. “Hi, honey,” he yells. “I’m here!”

Dean laughs from the kitchen. “You’re home?”

Cas smiles at the correction and feigns ignorance. “I hope so!” he says, loosening his tie and unbuttoning his shirt with one hand as he puts his briefcase in the closet with the other.

He steps into the kitchen and Dean kisses him quickly before heading back to the stove where three pots bubble. “The saying is ‘Hi, honey, I’m home,’” Dean laughs.

“You know I can never remember all those quotes and things.”

“It’s a common saying, babe.”

Cas waves it off, stifling a grin. “What would you pick on me for if I always got them right?”

Dean turns around for another kiss. “Got me there. Go get changed, dinner’s in twenty. If you’re quick, you can go do bendy stuff on the porch.” He wiggles his eyebrows suggestively. 

“Sensei would appreciate your terminology,” Cas says, passing behind Dean to get to the hallway and noting how full the pots are. “Did you invite the entire town?”

“Nah, this one’s dinner. That’s lunches, and that’s for the potluck at the Gruber’s this weekend.”

Cas chuckles. “Every time I think I’m the organized one…”

“Yeah, yeah. Well, you’ve got enough to keep track of at work, Mr. City Manager. I’ll keep track of the potlucks if you take care of the rest of the city.”

“Deal,” Cas laughs as he heads into the bedroom, shedding his suit pants and pulling on sweats. “I’ll be back soon,” he calls out, heading for the three season porch in the back.

“Twenty minutes,” Dean reminds him as Cas closes the door.

The rain pounds on the roof as he stretches and moves into a slow warm up. He won’t be able to get a full workout in, now. Maybe later, while Dean is watching Dr. Sexy or following up on work emails. It’s been a long time since he was in a dojo, but he tries to keep it up, even if it's more meditation than match-ready these days. It’s been a decade since he’s had to do anything beyond a gentle de-escalation of an upset citizen.

* * *

Cas is just coming back inside when the doorbell rings.

“I’ve got it,” he yells to Dean, trying to think who would be stopping by. Charlie returned the chainsaw last week and he doesn’t remember loaning anything else out. Could be a canvas of some sort. Political, maybe, or someone trying to convince them to change their energy provider…

He opens the door to find a stranger there - tall and pale and shivering and absolutely soaking wet. 

“Can I...help you?” Cas asks, puzzled.

“Dean,” the man says, breathless. “Where's...where's Dean?”

And then he topples forward into Cas’s arms.

He’s huge. The guy is absolutely enormous and lanky - there are arms and legs splayed everywhere.

“Dean!” Cas calls, lowering his armful of giant to the ground. “Dean!”

“Hey, Cas, what’s…” 

The silence is deafening. Cas can _hear_ the world grinding to a halt. He looks over his shoulder and Dean is still, almost as pale as the man who just fell into Cas’s arms, looking like he’s trying to drag air in and not having much success.

“Baby?” Cas asks.

Something snaps over Dean’s features - an emotional lockdown like Cas hasn’t seen in years. “Get him inside. Guest room.” Dean strides forward and grabs the giant’s legs, and they move down the hallway and heave him onto the bed. “Get me the first aid kit?” he asks quietly. He doesn’t look up. His eyes are fixed on the pale man’s features, like he’s looking at a ghost.

Cas tries not to think too hard about that look as he fishes the first aid kit out from under the sink. That look of deep regret. Longing. Sorrow. 

Cas shakes his head and brings the first aid kit to Dean.

Dean’s already moving - the man’s boots are off and his flannel is shoved halfway down his arms, and Dean’s managed to slice the t-shirt down the middle with the pocket knife he always carries, like some triage nurse from Dr. Sexy.

There are purple bruises starting to form on the man’s ribs and abdomen.

“C’mon, Sammy,” Dean mutters under his breath. “C’mon, man.”

“Here,” Cas offers quietly, and Dean takes the kit and rustles through it, pulling a penlight out and looking into their guest’s eyes.

Sam. Cas has heard that name before. Not recently. Not since Dean stopped drinking. But it’s the one name that used to come up over and over, and Dean was never less than completely wrecked by it.

“Grab me some blankets,” Dean says, voice steady and emotionless. “He’s in shock, just need to find the wound.”

Cas’s mind spins over too little information, moments, names, the questions that used to make Dean clam up and shake his head. _“I’m out of that, now,”_ he’d say. _“New leaf. New me. Into the light, huh, Cas? You and me. Just you and me, now.”_

He brings back the blankets from the living room. The one with the modern lantern pattern that Dean had gotten him for Christmas. The old tattered one with the wolves on it that Dean had lingered over at Target.

“Dental floss,” Dean says, almost too low to hear. “And rubbing alcohol.”

Cas feels like a character in one of Dean’s cowboy films, like he’s the assistant to the gruff but capable doctor. 

It had been like this for a while when they first met - gruff, short sentences. Shadowed eyes and that gorgeous jaw always clamped a little too tight. 

Dean has blossomed in the time since. He’s become a member of their neighborhood. He greets Mrs. Zullo on her way to the mailbox, and Ms. Butler on her way to school. He helps people change their spark plugs or their tires, tells the kids to put on their bike helmets. He isn’t that terse, angry, suppressed twenty-five year old anymore.

Well. _Hadn’t_ been. 

Dean is cutting the seam of the giant’s pants when Cas gets back, and then there’s blood. It’s dark, starting to dry or clot or something, and Cas has to look away. 

He must make a noise. Dean’s eyes, sharp and impatient, look over at him and nod to the corner. “Sit down,” he says. “Don’t look. I can’t take care of both of you.”

Cas nods and leaves the floss and the alcohol at the foot of the bed before he does what he’s told.

He watches as Dean pulls gauze from the kit, tears it open, soaks it in alcohol and then fills the floss container with alcohol, too. He’s got a towel from the linen closet, and it’s going to be ruined with the blood, but it doesn’t phase him a bit. He swipes it over the gash and Cas studies the wall art over the bed. 

There’s an injured man in their house, and Dean has regressed fifteen years in two minutes, and Cas feels like he’s visiting the twilight zone as he watches Dean pull a needle out of a pack, thread it with dental floss, and begin stitching the hole in their guest.

Cas would suggest a hospital, but a cold knot in his stomach says not to bother. 

_“Out of the darkness,”_ he remembers Dean saying. _“Out of the darkness and into the light.”_

* * *

The morning is bright and everything feels strangely normal in the kitchen. Coffee machine percolating softly as birds chirp outside. The smell of that Columbian blend that Anna and Gabe roast at the coffee shop down the street. It feels like his life. Same as yesterday morning, the morning before that.

But it’s not. Everything is different.

Dean stumbles in and mumbles under his breath, looks almost himself if Cas ignores the bags under his eyes.

“One minute,” Cas says softly. “It’s almost ready.”

“You’re a godsend, babe,” Dean says, sliding his arms under Cas’s, around his waist and then pressing his face into Cas’s shoulder. “Thank you.”

Cas squeezes his arm. “Of course.” They stand in silence until the machine is spitting the last of the coffee into the carafe. “Do you want to talk about it?”

He feels Dean stiffen and then slowly, slowly relax again. His hands fall from Cas’s waist and Cas wonders if he pushed too far. 

“It’s all right—”

“No, no,” Dean says, sounding exhausted. “Just gimme some of that first.”

Cas chuckles. “Black as your heart, love,” he says softly as he sets it down. He puts honey in his and sits down.

Dean smiles up at him but there’s no humor in it. “You say it like it’s a joke.”

As if it’s not a joke Dean himself started years ago. Cas raises an eyebrow. “It is.”

Dean shakes his head and takes a long swallow. “Not as much as you’d think. That guy in there…”

“Sam?” Cas prompts after a moment.

Dean’s breath shudders out of him, full of some repressed emotion, and Cas is ready to hear a story of star crossed lovers, some wrong side of the tracks story, but what Dean says is:

“He’s my little brother.”

And Cas’s mind, which has been reeling for the past 14 hours, gets stuck on that, uncomprehending. “Your...your brother?”

Dean’s answer is curt. “Yeah, Cas, did I stutter?”

Cas feels his jaw clench at Dean’s tone and allows himself the arch of an eyebrow in annoyance, but nothing more. It’s obvious Dean’s on edge, and confronting him about small things, no matter how irritating, isn’t going to improve the situation. 

Dean wipes a hand over his face. “Sorry, man. I’m sorry. He’s just...I never…” He sighs. Long and heavy and full of years and memories Cas knows he’s been trying to leave behind.

Cas reaches out to touch his arm, smooth over his bicep, and Dean catches his hand like a lifeline, holding so tight it hurts.

“I didn’t think I’d ever see him again.”

“Is he going to be staying here?” Cas asks.

“Well, I don’t know where the fuck else he’d go,” Dean snarls.

Cas takes a deep breath. “A hospital? A safehouse? A friend’s? I don’t know, Dean. You were a little vague with the details the last time we talked about your family.” Cas crushes down his anger. He knows that this is Dean’s way of getting space, of getting people to run away. Cas thought he’d proven himself and gotten past all this, but apparently not. He doesn’t let his hand drop away from Dean’s arm, just repositions so he can hold Dean’s hand, palm to palm.

Dean nods. Swallows. Looks out the window to what is proving to be an offensively nice day. “Yeah, I know, Cas. I’m sorry. This just has me… _Christ_. I don’t even know what to think. No idea how the kid found me. Who else is coming behind him.” He looks up, catches Cas’s eyes. “This could get bad, you know. Real bad.”

Cas squeezes his hand. “We’ll figure it out. Do you need me home today?”

Dean shakes his head. “No. I took the day, I’ll take care of it.”

* * *

There’s an old black car in the garage where his Explorer usually is. Dean must have swapped them sometime last night. Cas finds the SUV parked in the driveway and drives to work in a daze. There’s a fugitive of some sort in his house, stitched expertly together with dental floss and an upholstery needle.

* * *

“Oh. Hello,” Cas says, stepping into the kitchen to find the giant - Sam - wearing his sweatpants and an oversized t-shirt.

Sam smiles a crooked smile full of perfect teeth, his expression bashful, and Cas almost laughs with the normalcy of it. The _innocence_. He gets that Twilight Zone feeling again, something like vertigo.

“Hey, there,” he says, voice a bit rough. “I’m Sam.” As if Cas doesn’t know who tried to bleed to death in his guest room. 

“Dean’s brother.” Cas shakes his hand after one aimless moment of indecision.

Sam nods. “Yeah. It’s been a long time. You guys have a great thing going here. I’ll be out of your hair in no time, no worries. Sorry to, ah, drop in like this.”

“It’s...it’s good to meet you,” Cas finally says.

Sam nods. “You too, Cas.” His tone is wistful.

Dean comes in from the other doorway to the kitchen and watches like a predator. Cas had forgotten that he did that.

Sam turns, honing in on Dean like he has some sixth sense. “Look how domestic you are, man! And dad always said _I_ was the soft one.” He starts to laugh but chokes on it and grabs just above his thigh. Cas hopes he doesn’t bleed through the dressing. He really likes those sweatpants.

“Fuck off, bitch,” Dean mutters, but his face isn’t angry. It’s worried. Scared. Lit up from the inside like something has been ignited.

“Truth hurts, jerk,” Sam says, a little breathless. “Can I get some more ibuprofen?”

“Leave it in your room again?” Dean grouses. “Gotta do everything around here,” he mutters, backing out and padding down the hall. 

It’s the same way he is with Cas when he’s sick. When he’d had the flu the previous fall, Dean hadn’t stopped griping at him the whole time, but wouldn’t let Cas do a thing for himself for _days_. He’d set him up with meals in color coded boxes, clear broth in a hot thermos, cold water in a cold thermos, and enough blankets to smother Cas to death.

“He loves you a lot,” Cas observes.

Sam looks down at his hands in sudden fascination.

* * *

Dean seems marginally more relaxed when Cas gets home the next day. Sam is on the couch watching TV and fiddling with a can of seltzer. “Any way I can get a beer?” he asks softly, as if somehow Cas will be easier to convince than Dean.

Cas shakes his head, loosening his tie and starting to unbutton his shirt before he realizes it might be inappropriate. “We don’t drink.”

Sam tips his head in confusion and then his eyes widen. “Oh. Oh, shit, I’m sorry. He didn’t...I didn’t know. Bet that wasn’t easy.”

Cas doesn’t know what to say. It’s private, those long nights of waiting and being afraid and watching one token get washed away to be replaced with another a month or two later, and then having to wait, and watch, and dread that it could happen all over again.

He’s been trying not to think about it lately, how something like this, like Sam, could tip Dean over again. Something like this could make a drink seem like an easy way to take the edge off. But he trusts Dean. He has to.

“Not for either of us,” he says softly. “But he’s worth it.” 

And Sam looks up at him and smiles slowly, beautifically. “Goddamn. I wondered how he got here after...after everything. I hope you know…” He closes his eyes. Opens them a few moments later, and that wide smile fades into something sad. “I’ll leave you to it as soon as I’ve healed up a bit. Just need a fighting chance.”

Cas doesn’t know what to say, but then Dean comes in with snack food and seltzer and collapses down next to his brother.

“Why don’t you slip into something more comfortable?” Dean tells Cas archly as he leans back, body pressed against his brother’s with absolute ease.

Cas smiles crookedly and heads to the bedroom. Everything inside him is uneasy, off kilter. He knows Dean loves him. He’s never doubted it. But Sam has changed something. Sam has changed _them_. He’s hurt, and he’s sweet, and he’s scared, and he’s putting on a brave face that is fooling no one.

Something has changed, and Cas doesn’t even know how to start getting it back. Doesn’t even know if he wants to.


	2. Two

Sam slaps the remote into his palm a few times and then holds it up. “You got any batteries? I think it’s dead.”

Cas laughs. “Ask Dean, he’s good with those things. Last time he fixed it, we got thirty new channels.”

Sam grins. “So he hasn’t gone _completely_ Stepford.” His grin goes a little guilty as he looks over. “No offense,” he offers.

Cas shrugs, amused. “None taken.”

“He used to build all sorts of stuff when we were kids. Like, ‘ET phone home’ stuff. He made alarms for our hotel rooms, a radio out of...I don’t even know what. It was amazing.”

“He built both our computers, and he fixes and upgrades things around the house. The TV. The toaster. We’ve got dimming switches in every room and he put some kind of miracle AI into the shower. It’s heavenly.”

Sam gives him a sly smile, like they're in on some joke together. “Does it play Led Zeppelin?”

Cas laughs, the first time he’s really relaxed completely in Sam’s presence. “I’m sure that’s up next,” he says, and steals some popcorn from Sam’s bowl.

"He was always terrible about music. I was never allowed to play anything _I_ liked. It was, like, mullet rock all the way with him."

Cas laughs. “Well, he’s gotten better, there, thank goodness. Unless we're driving somewhere," he amends. "Which we don't get to do very much anymore. But he'll say..." He trails off, snorting laughter and adopting his best ‘Dean’ voice. "Driver picks the music--"

"Shotgun shuts his cakehole," Sam laughs. "The more things change, huh?"

Cas's laughter trails off slowly. There's so much he doesn't know. “He’s not the same.”

Sam looks over, unflinching. “I know that, Cas. I see it. He’s happy here. I’ve never seen him so happy. When we were kids, it wasn’t anything like this. Maybe it was for Dean, I guess, before... My dad...he, ah. He kinda went crazy after my mom.” 

“She died when you were a baby?” Dean had been vague about timelines and details, but Cas is piecing it together, now.

“Yeah,” Sam says. He shrugs and looks away, out the window. “Died. Murdered. Guess the end result was the same.”

“And Dean was all you had.”

Sam shrugs. “Yeah, I guess. My dad just couldn’t get it together. I mean, he’s better, now. Still goes off sometimes. Like now. But he's got a home. A plan. Guys he works with. It's not _so_ bad.”

“You could stay here,” Cas offers.

Sam laughs bitterly. “No, I can’t. There are people after me. There always will be and...I can’t let them find you. Dean.”

“Sam,” he asks, not sure if he’s asking for himself or Dean. “Are you...will you be okay?”

Something complex washes over Sam’s face. He licks his lips and looks at the end table. “I hope so. Nothing you guys need to worry about, you know? You’ve done enough.”

Sam is different than Dean was when they first met, but it’s easy to see they’re cut from the same cloth. Sam is sincere where Dean deflected, and sad where Dean was angry. But underneath it, Cas can see that Sam thinks he’s worthless, just like Dean did, and Cas longs to prove him wrong.

Cas reaches out to touch him, hesitates, and then keeps going, resolute. He strokes the back of Sam’s hand with his thumb. “We just want you to be safe. Dean would...we just want to help.”

Sam laughs it off and pulls his hand away, and when Cas looks up Dean is standing in the doorway with a look on his face that is impossible to decipher.

* * *

That night, Dean takes him apart slowly. Every trick they’ve ever learned, Dean puts to good use. He's slow and methodical and despite all Cas’s best intentions, Dean drags sounds out of him he can’t hold back. He can’t catch his breath. Dean makes him beg, slides into him at long last with a sigh, and Cas feels so full he could cry with it—the way Dean promises, silently, gently, thoroughly, that they still belong to each other. 

It’s not that Cas doubts it. Not really. But he’d needed this. How does Dean always know when he really _needs_ it?

“Love you,” Cas whispers, Dean curved behind him, breath warm against his shoulder.

“Mmmm,” Dean agrees, and Cas is reassured as Dean’s lips spell his dedication across Cas’s shoulders.

* * *

The voices in the kitchen are hushed, but Cas can still hear them as he comes down the hallway. He’s still sweating from his workout, just needs some water. But he slows down to listen, even knowing he shouldn’t.

“I have to go soon." Sam's voice is low and urgent. "The longer I stay here, the more likely—”

“Fuck that. You need time and a _plan,_ John Wick. You can barely walk.”

“It’s fine, I’ll go to Zachariah. He hates Azazel way more than he hates me.”

“Are you fucking kidding? That guy’s a scumbag! He’ll turn on you as soon as it’s convenient.”

“Yeah, but it’ll buy me _time_ , Dean. I don’t want to drag you into this. You and Cas, _Jesus_. Look at you. I just...I shouldn’t have come here. When I find dad—”

“Don’t you _dare—_ ”

“ _When I find dad,_ ” Sam continues urgently, “He and I can take care of Azazel. In the meantime, I go to Zach. It’s gonna be fine.”

“I don’t like it, Sammy. You’re one guy. This is big. This is really big and, man...I...I never thought I’d see you again. I _can’t_...”

“Look, you saved me already, okay? Twice at least, and probably a bunch I don’t know about. Right?”

“Yeah. And then I left you, Sam. I got out and I _left_ you there.”

There’s a pause and Sam responds, low and angry. “Don’t do that. I’m not stupid, Dean. Tom and Meg ambush me one day, and then the three of you disappear? C’mon. You led them away. You took care of it. No one’s seen them since.”

Dean makes a sound in his throat, assent and affront wound up together. “Yeah, well, they’re not likely to. Not unless someone decides to take down the Family Arena.”

Cas knows he’s stumbled into something intensely private. Something he has no right to be eavesdropping on. He takes a breath and strides into the kitchen, grabbing a cup and pressing it against the dispenser on the fridge door before he turns toward the brothers.

“Take out tonight?” he asks, taking a long drink.

He pretends not to see the way Dean slides his hand off Sam’s.

* * *

Dean is reading in bed when Cas comes in and strips down, tossing his clothes in the hamper.

“Dean,” he says quietly, looking at the grain of the door. He doesn’t even know what to say. There’s so much he wants to know, and so little he has a right to.

Dean takes a deep breath and then puts down his book and smiles over at him. “Hey, babe.”

“Can we talk?”

Dean grimaces. “That's never good,” he says, but there’s no bite to it. It’s more...resigned. "What’s up?”

Cas chews his lip. The words escape before he has time to rephrase, to soften it. “You want to be with him.” It’s not a question.

Dean shrugs uncomfortably. “He’s my brother, Cas. I missed him, y’know?”

“That’s not what I mean.”

Dean looks down and Cas thinks he’s going to deflect again. “Things were real fucked up when we were kids, Cas. All we had was each other.”

“I’m not judging you. You must know by now, I'd never judge you for what you want.”

“Well, I am. Enough for both of us, probably.” His smile is crooked with pain. 

Cas kisses him softly. His cheek, his temple.

Dean folds into him, head down and pressed into his chest. “Always too good for me,” he says, and it would be too soft to hear except Cas knows the rhythm of it. He’s heard it a million times. Another thing he thought they’d left behind.

“Never. Dean. _Never_. I wouldn’t trade you for the world.”

“I know...look, I know I’m being an asshole. I just don’t know how to help him and still be...this.”

“People change, Dean. I love you no matter what.”

Dean shakes his head and looks up. “You don’t know that. You don’t know who I was back then.”

He pauses for long enough that Cas opens his mouth to reassure him.

Then Dean continues, “I couldn’t tell him. When I left. He was out on a job, and I _left_ him, Cas. I left him there and didn’t even tell him I was going.”

“He doesn’t blame you. He came here because he trusts you.”

“ _Fuck_ , I missed him.”

“It’s okay.” He pulls Dean closer, heart aching. “Dean, whatever you need - from him, from me - it’s okay.”

Dean holds him hard enough to bruise, and Cas promises again, "It's okay."

And his heart breaks when he realizes it's just like it used to be, when Dean could only say ‘I love you’ by hanging on too tight.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A lot of angst in this one, but I promise it'll all be worth it!


	3. Three

“Dean’s worried about you. We both are.” Cas watches as Sam studies the lamp, then the window.

Sam still has a limp, but he’s started working out — pull ups and planks that make Cas cringe inside, knowing how painful it was when he’d had his appendix out and tried to get back into shape.

“He’s always felt responsible, Cas. Danger of being a big brother, I guess. You both worry way too much.”

Cas doesn’t mention how he’d tried to die on their doorstep. 

It’s infuriating to feel like a storm is brewing and he has no control over it. No control because they keep pretending it’s not happening — both of them, and it’s making him insane. Their furiously quiet conversations stop as soon as Cas shows his face. They keep pretending everything is fine and it’s absolutely clear that it isn’t. It’s starting to feel like he’s the fugitive, here. In his own home. In his own relationship.

“You were close, weren’t you? When you were young?”

Sam looks up, his expression cautious. “Yeah, we were.” He shrugs self-consciously. “Inseparable.”

“Is that why you’re fighting now?”

Sam laughs and rubs his face. He takes a deep breath. “I mean, I don’t know if we know how to do it any other way.” He laughs softly. “If we’re talking we’re fighting. But we care about each other.”

Cas nods. “I know you do. Very much. Do you...want it back? What you had, before?”

Sam looks at him for a long moment. Licks his lips. “Does it matter? I’m not the one who left.” He holds up his hands, keeping Cas quiet. “And he had good reason, don’t get me wrong. But I just think...you’re talking to the wrong person.”

Cas looks down at his hands. Yet again, he’s not sure what to say. How to talk about something that's barely formed at the back of his mind. “It’s not important, I’m sorry,” he finally says. “We need to focus on keeping you safe.”

When Cas looks up, Sam’s mouth is twisted, nostrils flared. “You both are idiots,” he says flatly, and Cas thinks the conversation is done. 

Then Sam speaks, voice quiet. “You’re a better man than I’ll ever be. I’d never take that from him.”

Cas can see how much it hurts Sam to say it. He wants to reach out, pull him in, reassure him. 

As if things weren’t complicated enough.

He weighs his words carefully. Finally he says, “Sam, I’m not asking him to choose between us. Would you...is that what you need?”

Sam’s eyes go wide with surprise.

* * *

Cas stands in the doorway to the kitchen and waits for them to catch sight of him. There’s something about watching them that makes him ache. They stand close. Some might say _too_ close, but Cas has never been good with personal space, either.

Sam laughs and smacks Dean on the arm; Dean laughs, too, the kind that crinkles his eyes. He holds up a bite of bacon; Sam takes the entire thing in his mouth, all the way to Dean’s first knuckle, and Cas watches Dean press his finger into his brother’s mouth further, gaze intense and hot, everything slow-motion, and there is no mistaking that expression. Then the world winds up again, sounds filter back in, and Dean catches sight of Cas.

“Hey, babe,” he greets. “I was just making breakfast. Sammy here thinks he’s still a growing boy.”

Sam laughs, and Cas can’t tell if the hollowness is in Sam’s voice or just the ringing in his ears. “Well,” Sam retorts, “I’m growing back a significant chunk of my abdomen.”

Dean scoffs. “‘ _Significant chunk._ ’ You’ve got a paper cut, you baby.”

“Yeah, okay, Dean,” Sam says, shaking his head. He spoons out some eggs and tosses some bacon on a plate, then grabs another and fills it. “Need anything fancy, Cas?”

“Hmmm?” Cas manages. He folds into one of the chairs at the table and notes how easily Sam is moving around the house, now. 

“I dunno, truffle oil or something?”

Dean shoves him. “Don’t be an ass. Get the hot sauce out of the fridge, will you?”

Sam snorts and grabs the hot sauce before he sits down, holding it between two long fingers and balancing a plate over it. His long legs stretch out, rubbing Cas’s calf on the way by.

When he sets the plates down, it’s one for Cas and one for him, and Cas tries not to think about it as anything other than a passing kindness.

* * *

Cas is restless after hours of watching the brothers orbit each other like planets. He’s pretending to read his book. He’s fairly certain Dean is pretending, too.

“He can’t stay here,” Dean says quietly.

Cas gives up and sets the book down. “I know.”

“And I can’t let him go back alone. I left to keep him safe. And I thought it was enough, I thought it...absolved me, or something. That, after that, it was his choice. But I can’t do it again. I can’t go on living easy when he’s living hard.” He won’t look at Cas.

Cas takes his hand and turns toward him. He doesn’t close the gap between them. The space feels necessary for the conversation.

He’s known it was coming. He’s been thinking about it for days. “You’re leaving, then?” he asks. _Leaving me_ he means. And he wants to be okay with that, because he’s always believed that a relationship was between two people that chose to be together every day. But a chasm is opening in his chest.

“I...babe, I _have_ to.” Dean’s voice is brittle. “I don’t _want_ to, you have to know… But it’s a death sentence if he goes alone. Azazel...you’ve never seen anything like him. He’s about as evil as they come, Cas, and he’s gunning for my little brother.” He looks up, eyes pleading. “I don’t want to lose you, I just..I can’t let him go and pretend like I couldn’t have helped.” 

Cas can hear the pain in his voice as he continues.

“You don’t deserve that - to have to wonder, and wait. If Sam and I...we end up dead and buried somewhere, or tossed in jail...you’d never know. Isn’t it easier if we just...say we had a good run?” His voice cracks, and Cas sighs in relief as he hauls Dean close.

He buries his face in Dean’s neck and feels him tremble. “I always thought we should go on a real roadtrip,” he says quietly.

Dean goes stiff in his arms.

Cas continues. “Did you know that the world’s largest ball of twine is in Kansas?”

Dean’s hand spans the back of his neck, pulls him back, and then Cas is staring into Dean’s eyes. “Cas, you know it’s not safe, right? You know _I’m_ not safe. I’m not who you thought I was. I’m..I _killed_ people. And it’s not over. I’m still that guy.”

Cas shakes his head, the war of fear and absolute certainty making him light headed. “I don’t believe this has been a lie. The years we’ve spent together? I know this is you, too, Dean.”

“Cas, I—”

“I _know_ you, Dean. Smith. Winchester. I don’t care what you call yourself. I _know_ you. And I’m going with you.”

* * *

Sam is gone when they wake up. The old car, the black classic one Dean told him to keep out of sight, is gone, too. 

Dean’s face is suddenly drawn. Sick. Sallow. “Guess it runs in the family, huh?” He’s got a death grip on Cas’s hand.

“What’s that?”

“Leaving. Leaving without…” He shakes his head and turns back to the door, heads inside and goes straight for the bathroom. Cas hears the lock twist.

Next will be the shower, and when he comes out in twenty minutes they’ll both pretend he hasn’t been crying in there. 

Cas feels like he’s being torn apart. Dean had been happy. They’d been happy, and then Sam had come, and Cas had seen a new side of Dean. The one who watched his brother with hungry eyes, studied him like a wild animal. Studied him like he might never see him again. And Cas had liked that Dean, too. That hungry, lean version.

And now...Cas doesn’t even know how to start picking up the pieces. They’d had something beautiful here. Something simple and pure and full of love. It had been tested early on but here they’d been in this life they’d built, with the white picket fence Dean had picked out and put up in some sort of fit of spite, and Cas hadn’t understood, exactly, but he’d known it was another way for Dean to step into the light.

The water starts running in the bathroom and Cas sits gingerly on the couch. Remembers Sam sitting there, he and Dean wound up in each other, Cas on the couch arm, stroking Dean’s hair. It had felt good, then. The three of them.

* * *

He doesn’t have a plan beyond comfort when he hears the door open, but it’s not the bathroom door. It’s behind him. The garage door.

“Morning, Cas,” Sam says, and Cas has no control over what he does next. He pins Sam to the wall, heart beating out of his chest, something like terror pouring through him.

“Where the _hell_ have you been?” he hisses.

“Whoa, whoa,” Sam says. “What are you talking about? I had to run some errands. I got breakfast.”

Something happens in Cas, something that threatens to be a sob, but is absolutely fury when it exits his body. “We’ve been _hiding_ you, Sam. What the fuck were you _thinking?_ ”

He releases Sam abruptly and stalks to the kitchen, starts assembling coffee with shaking hands. The shower is still running. 

Sam doesn’t move.

Cas fills the carafe with water and feels tears rise in his throat.

“He’s not taking a shower, is he?” Sam asks quietly.

Cas can’t look. He starts the coffee and shakes his head. _No._

“You thought I left.”

Cas nods and starts taking out mugs. Two. 

One more.

“I’m going soon,” Sam says quietly. He’s closer, now. Close enough to touch, but Cas doesn’t.

“I know,” Cas says flatly. He doesn’t elaborate. He doesn’t even know how to feel, he’s been on a roller coaster of elation and fear and planning and hoping and wondering - his life hasn’t been this up in the air since he moved to Ohio twenty years ago.

He looks up, and Sam’s eyes catch his. They stare at each other, and Cas has no idea what his face is doing, but he can see that Sam is holding his mouth just a little too taut, his head a little too high. He’s afraid, and he’s hurt, and Cas wonders if Sam can see the same in him. 

Dean would.

“I shouldn’t have come here, Cas. I’m sorry.” Sam says quietly. “I knew Dean would help, I wanted to see him, but I should have found another way.”

Cas swallows. “You’re here, now. It would have destroyed him if you’d left alone.”

“Really fucked everything up, huh?” Sam shakes his head and looks away.

“No, Sam.” Cas turns toward him. “He needs you, you know. I think...you need each other.”

Sam laughs, a broken sound. “No. Cas, no. He needs _you._ God, look at all this. Look at you. I mean, we never dreamed anything like this was possible, back when we were kids. You, this, it’s everything we—he ever wanted.”

Cas tries not to think what it means, the way Sam looks at him, pleading and sad. The way it twists in his stomach, the way he has to force himself not to step close.

The bathroom door opens, loud as a gunshot, and Dean steps through. “Hey,” he says, and Cas turns, and watches Dean’s face fall, start to crumble, turn to stone, and then his chin is up and he’s looking at his brother with an intensely blank face.

Sam strides past Cas, reaching out and then letting his arms fall to his sides at the last minute. “Shit, Dean, I’m sorry,” he says. 

Dean closes his eyes and nods. Shakes his head, his lips pressed together.

Sam touches his shoulder and Dean moves forward and then Sam yanks him in and buries his face low in Dean’s neck. Dean’s head turns into his chest, and it’s crystal clear that they’re brothers but so much more. 

And Cas had meant what he said, that whatever Dean needs, it’s okay, and he’d meant this when he’d said it. But it still sits in him like some festering wound, like something undone and unfinished.

Sam and Dean unfold slowly, just a few inches between them. Sam’s hand rests on the back of Dean’s neck, Cas can see long fingers curved around the sharp tendons there, resting easy as if they belong. As if Cas hadn’t set his lips there just last night, just this morning.

“Sammy,” Dean whispers, and then he hauls Sam’s head down abruptly until his mouth is against Sam’s ear. “You better have a _damn_ good reason for going out there, asshole,” he snarls. 

The tension drains out of Sam suddenly, and he laughs. He presses a kiss into Dean’s neck almost too quickly for Cas to catch. “Hey, I was careful, I promise. I had to—I got croissants.”

Dean sighs and relaxes minutely. Cas watching his fists tighten and then loosen in Sam’s shirt. “Jesus. It’s like you know me.”

He turns and ferrets out the paper bag and the newspaper that Sam dropped by the door, and grabs Cas’s hand as he heads for the kitchen and turns on the oven.

* * *

It’s after eleven when they’re both in bed and Dean clicks off his light and turns toward Cas. The darkness makes everything a bit more intimate, so when Dean slides a hand up the outside of his thigh, Cas whimpers. 

“Hey, babe?” Dean whispers, a slight strain in his voice that begs for reassurance.

Cas runs his thumb along Dean’s hip. “You all right?”

“Yeah. I, ah...I kissed Sam today,” Dean tells him.

It takes a moment for Cas to process it, and he feels the expected flicker of jealousy, but also an intense flare over his skin. _Hunger_. 

He presses forward, flattens his hand against Dean’s side, brings his mouth nearly to Dean’s. “Tell me,” he says, voice rough.

“Oh. _Fuck_ , babe,” Dean gasps, moving in until Cas can feel the heat of him - thigh and chest and body nearly touching. His hand moves to the inside of Cas’s thigh, moving up slowly, leaving Cas breathless. “I know you said it was okay but it was still kind of an accident. I was coming into the kitchen, he was coming out...we ran into each other. He grabbed me, just instinctual, you know?” And Dean’s thumb grazes Cas’s scrotum, making him gasp.

“He kissed me, really. Big moose like that, I’d have to climb him if I wanted to start something. But he didn’t push it. Told me—“

Cas licks Dean’s ear and is gratified when Dean stutters, then continues as Cas moves down the line of his jaw, his throat. 

“Said he’d missed it, told me I was real lucky. Couldn’t shut up about how sweet, how perfect, how fucking hot you are. ‘S if I don’t know.”

Cas moans softly. “Tell me about the kiss, Dean.”

“Hush,” Dean tells him, cocky again. “It’s my story.” He pulls, one long stroke over Cas’s cock, effectively shutting him up. 

“He pressed me against the fridge. Kissed me, slow and hot - haven’t kissed him since he got so damn huge, kid’s got muscles like you, babe, built like a gladiator.”

“Did you like it?” Cas asks as Dean strokes him, and he’s trying to listen but it’s so hard when Dean touches him like that.

“Fuck, yeah. Yeah, I did. He’s fucking huge but I got him so worked up, babe, he could barely talk—“ He speeds up, jerking Cas in earnest, and Cas is listening but can’t ask, can’t respond, can’t beg to hear how Sam’s mouth tastes. 

“He wanted me to tell him—uhhh—“ as Cas slips his hand into Dean’s sweats and grabs his cock to return the favor. 

“Wanted to know what it’s like— _oh, fuck_ —with you.”

Cas grinds to a halt. “What?”

Dean strokes him slowly, pulling him back in. “Yeah, he wanted me to tell him what it was like to be with you. Fuck you. Have you inside me.”

Cas starts to shake under Dean’s relentless attention. “Wha—“ Cas says, breathless. “What did you say?”

Dean shifts his angle and suddenly Cas is on fire. 

“Told him,” Dean says, biting off each word as he jacks Cas with single minded attention, “He should find out for himself.”

Cas comes hard, arching up without meaning to, biting down on the startled cry lodged in his throat. “Oh, God,” he finally manages. “Oh my God. Baby. Holy shit.”

Dean chuckles and kisses his cheek, his jaw. “Holy shit is right.” He presses their bodies together and slides his cheek against Cas’s. Finally, he whispers, “You just came so hard thinking about my brother, huh?”

“ _Fuck._ ”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> One more after this, they had to do some feeling processing before we get to the epic and sexy conclusion I know we've all been waiting for... :)


	4. Four

“Sam?”

The door is open, but Cas doesn’t want to just walk in. It may be temporary, but the room is Sam’s for now.

“Hey, Cas.” Sam snaps the laptop shut and sets it aside. “What’s up?”

“Oh, I was wondering if I could...put a few things in here.”

Sam tips his head. “I mean, it’s your house, you can do whatever you want.”

Cas laughs softly. “Yes, I suppose it is. I just meant...Dean is having a hard time believing that I’m all right with…” He gestures loosely at Sam, then encompasses the room.

Sam shakes his head. “Us. Right. He’s not the only one. This is honestly...I’m waiting for the other shoe to drop. How are you okay with it?”

Cas shrugs. “I think…” He hesitates and looks around the room. “The only thing that scares me more than losing Dean is watching him lose himself.” He sits gingerly on the edge of the bed, as far from Sam as he can manage while still sitting on the same piece of furniture. “It’s not easy. But...I can’t tell him how to live his life. We learned that a long time ago. His choices are his. We listen to each other, of course. But it’s important to have...autonomy.”

Sam nods slowly. 

“Which is why he’s accepted that I’m going with you.”

Sam sits up, obviously surprised. “Wait, what? You’re coming with us?”

Cas ignores the way his stomach drops at Sam’s surprise. “Yes.”

“Cas…” Sam trails off, sounding helpless. Sounding just like Dean does, every time it comes up. _Pained._

“I told you. My choices are mine. You came here for help, we’re going to help you.”

Sam sighs. “Jesus. Did Dean tell you—”

“That it’s dangerous?” Cas cuts him off. He doesn’t need another list of reasons he shouldn’t do it. “Yes.”

“That we’re…” Sam grimaces and scrubs his face with his hand in a familiar gesture, and Cas smiles briefly. “We’re not the good guys, here.”

Cas shakes his head. “I know Dean very well, Sam. I know he’s not a bad person. I don’t think you are, either. Look, I can’t say if you’re good guys, but I know you’re not bad. I know you don’t want to hurt innocent people.”

Sam opens his mouth and then closes it, and Cas decides to change the subject. 

“So, can I leave Dean’s book here, a pair of his reading glasses?”

Sam stares at him a long moment and then nods.

“Thank you, Sam,” Cas says. He leaves the book and glasses on the bedside table closest to the door and turns to leave.

“How are you even real?” Sam asks, sounding confused and awed in a way that makes Cas blush. 

He smiles softly, unsure what to say. “Goodnight,” he finally says softly.

* * *

“You didn’t tell Sam I was coming with you.”

Dean stops with one foot in his pajama bottoms. “What?”

“Sam. You didn’t tell him I was going.”

“I mean…”

“Is it because you were worried about what he’d say, or because you still think you can talk me out of it?”

Dean raises an eyebrow, and Cas can feel the argument coming. “Cas, c’mon. You know I don’t like it, but it’s not up to me…”

Cas nods, one eyebrow raised. “Exactly. Because we both get to make our own choices. It’s what we agreed to when you got out of rehab. Right? I don’t get to make choices for you. And you don’t get to make choices for me.”

“Yeah,” Dean mutters, yanking his pants up. “I know that, okay? I’m not trying to tell you what to do, I just don’t want you to get killed out there, is all! Sorry for caring about you, Jesus!”

Cas sighs and opts not to say anything. 

Dean looks at his nightstand and then looks around it in confusion. “The fuck?”

Cas gets up and takes Dean by the arm. “Dean.”

“Cas. Did you hide my book? Kinda petty, isn’t it?”

Cas huffs a laugh. “No,” he says gently. “But I did move it. You can bring it back, of course.”

Dean looks at him suspiciously.

“It’s in Sam’s room.”

“Sam’s room.”

“With your glasses.”

“Uh-huh.” The suspicion hasn’t wavered.

“I need you to believe me when I say it’s okay. You don’t have to steal moments with him when I’m not around, you can just...be with him. I want you to spend the night with him. Before everything else changes, too. I want you to know that when you wake up, I’ll still be here.”

Dean’s face does odd things. Then he smiles, slow and sheepish. 

At long last, he steps in and squeezes the breath right out of Cas’s lungs. “Jesus Christ, Cas. How on earth did you get so awesome?”

He kisses Dean’s neck with a soft laugh. “My therapist is on overtime.”

Dean snorts. “Well, tell them they’re great and they do good work.”

Cas kisses him, slow and deep, until the tension in his shoulders ease. “Goodnight, my love.”

“Big sap,” Dean mutters as he walks away, but Cas can see that he’s smiling.

* * *

It takes considerably longer than it probably should for Cas to get to sleep. He’s slept without Dean before. When one of them is travelling for work, typically. But it’s been a long time, and it’s never been because one of them was with someone else.

Cas knows he’s doing the right thing. He knows he can trust Dean. He knows that letting Dean and Sam be together is important.

And yet, his thoughts spin in his head, aimlessly, endlessly.

* * *

“Hey, baby.” 

Cas wakes to the press of kisses along his shoulder and neck, and while that’s all very nice, he’d rather be sleeping. “No,” he grumbles. 

Dean’s lips trace back up to his cheek, and Cas makes a discontented noise. Without opening his eyes, he rolls toward Dean, hooks an arm around his waist and rolls them both over. He wraps Dean in his arms, doing his best to spoon him into submission.

Dean laughs, far too awake. “C’mon, babe, it’s time to get up.”

“No.”

Dean wriggles around and kisses him again. “Sam and I are doing some planning in the kitchen, I got the impression you wanted in.”

Cas opens one eye and sighs. He does. He definitely does.

A muffled voice comes from the doorway. “I have coffee, are you decent?”

“Prude!” Dean calls, laughing.

Cas groans. “Coffee?” he asks hopefully.

Sam comes in holding a mug and trailing the scent of Columbian roast. Cas smiles gratefully and props himself up when Sam sets the mug on the nightstand. 

“Just the way you like it, I think,” Sam says. “Honey?”

“Yes, darling,” Cas returns, deadpan, grabbing the mug and breathing the coffee smell hungrily.

“No, I mean—”

Dean laughs. “Aw, even half asleep, he’s funnier than you, Sammy.”

Cas smiles at Dean and takes a few sips before sneaking a glance over the edge of the mug. Dean sits beside him, Sam at the foot of the bed. It feels good. Comfortable. “Did you have a good night?”

Sam glances over at Dean and they both look embarrassed for a moment. Cas waits.

Finally, Dean wiggles his eyebrows and winks at Sam. “You could say that.” 

Cas smiles and sips again. “I’m glad.” He takes a moment to check for that itch of jealousy, but it’s absent. “So,” he says, changing the subject. “What are we planning? A heist? A hostile takeover?”

Sam perks up. “Well, something like that. We were talking about the power structures—our problem is Azazel, but there are actually a few families out there that tend to trade territory—”

“Power structures? Are we...are you talking about the _mob_?” Cas is surprised despite himself.

Sam shrugs. “Well, not really. I mean, it’s Kansas, it’s like, banks and drugs and fronts, stuff like that.”

“Right,” Cas agrees. “A group of people who establish rules, control territory and bribe politicians and cops to get what they need where they need it?”

“Yeah?” Sam agrees with a shrug.

Cas nods, finishing his cup of coffee and feeling suddenly refreshed. “Organized crime. That’s the mob. Shit.” He shakes his head. “All right, walk me through it.”

He pauses. Holds up a finger. “Wait, let me get more coffee. Do you have a list of players? I can probably get some information on the political climate without arousing suspicion, I’m constantly researching policies and state government structures for work.”

He strips off his pants without thinking and puts on a pair of yoga pants before realizing he’s probably mooned Sam.

He turns back and grabs his empty cup. “Kitchen table? I’ll grab some paper from the study, I just need some visuals, I think.”

Cas can feel eyes on him as he walks out. They’re unusually silent and Cas tries not to take offense. They seem irritatingly surprised by the fact that he has ideas and interests.

He shakes his head. At least they’re including him now—he’ll show them what he has to offer.

* * *

It’s been two weeks of preparation followed by two very, very long days on the road. When Cas opens the hotel room door, Dean and Sam crowding in behind him he sees...one very large bed. 

For a single second, Cas contemplates going back and asking for a different room, and then he realizes he just doesn’t care. If It bothers Dean or Sam, they can ask. 

Cas steps in and collapses forward.

“I miss my bed,” he mumbles into the synthetic blankets.

“If we live, you can probably get it back,” Dean offers. “As long as the tenants don’t destroy it.”

Cas groans. “Don’t say that. I don’t want to think about that.”

“The tenants or the dying? Or the living?”

“Yes.”

“C’mon,” Dean says, pulling at Cas’s pants. “Get your pj’s on and climb in for real. We’re looking to get up at 6, swap plates at the Gas n’ Sip and then get on the road.”

“Why does crime start so early?” Cas groans.

Sam smacks him on the shoulder. “I feel your pain, buddy,” he says, falling back. “I always hated road trips. They were more Dean’s thing.”

Cas rolls over, tucking his face into Sam’s side, and Sam’s fingers curve into his hair.

They don’t touch like this. For Cas, it’s felt too fragile a thing to think about before they reach their destination.

But Cas doesn’t care. It feels good and he’s tired.

Dean’s voice forces him awake. “Hey, sleeping beauty, pick your ass up so I can get these off. _Then_ you can snuggle Sam.”

“Mmmm,” Cas grumps. Then he opens his eyes a bit and sighs, rolling back and lifting his hips so Dean can pull his jeans off. “Sorry.”

“C’mon,” Sam pulls him back up the bed and fights to pull the covers out from under him. Finally, after he’s twisted and been rolled into various configurations, Sam is pulling the covers up over him.

Finally, he’s got a pillow under his head and covers over one leg, and Dean crawls in on one side, and Sam curves in on the other, and despite the likelihood of their imminent death, it all feels pretty perfect.

* * *

Cas wakes with Sam’s head pillowed on his chest and Dean...is gone. “Dean?” he hisses in alarm, trying not to wake Sam.

“Shhh,” Dean says from the other side of the room. He comes back around and lies down. “I was just starting coffee, calm down,” he whispers. “Sammy scare you that much?’

Cas glares at him but Dean just smiles. 

“I love seeing you like this,” Dean tells him softly, smoothing his hair away from his face.

“Hmm?”

Dean looks down where Sam is curled into him, strokes his hair, too. “Like this. The two of you.”

Cas smiles and nods. He doesn’t know what to say, but he agrees. 

Dean kisses him, long and gentle, smoothes fingers along his jaw and throat. Cas smiles and just basks in it. It feels like it’s been a long time since they had something so unhurried.

Sam stirs against Cas and he and Dean look down.

Dean leans across Cas awkwardly and kisses his brother’s cheek. “Morning, lazy ass,” he says softly.

“Fuck off,” Sam murmurs, waving his middle finger generally in Dean’s direction without opening his eyes.

Dean grabs Sam’s hand as it goes by and uses it to push him over gently, kissing his lips in the same sweet way he’d just kissed Cas.

“K,” Sam breathes. “Maybe you don’t have to fuck off.”

Dean slides back a little, and down, so he and Sam are symmetrically aligned along Cas’s sides. “I put on coffee but we have some time.”

“Mmm,” Sam responds.

Cas smiles and his eyes drift shut. 

He opens them again to find Dean and Sam kissing just above him. He can see the flash of tongue, lazy between them, and his whole body takes notice.

“There you are, baby,” Dean says softly. “I was trying to tell Sam it was okay if he kissed you. But the bitch doesn’t believe me.” His tone is affectionate. 

Cas looks up. Sam is right there, hair tucked behind one ear, falling over his forehead on the other side. He’s very lovely up close. The soft upturn of his nose. The tiny lines when he smiles. The slight blush in his cheeks as Dean calls him out.

Cas nods. “It’s okay,” he says very quietly.

Sam touches his face gently, traces his lips, his cheekbone. “Okay,” he breathes, and brushes his mouth against Cas’s, electric and feather light.

Cas opens his mouth slightly, waits for Sam to come back. He steals a glance over to where Dean watches them, rapt. 

Sam dips into Cas’s mouth, tongue and lips sliding together, striking sparks, repeating.

Cas feels a curl of arousal sliding up his body. He reaches out, one hand searching for Dean’s in the sheets, the other smoothing through Sam’s hair. No pressure behind it. He doesn’t want to pull him in. He only wants what’s offered.

Sam leans in again, stays close and explores this time, and Cas opens his mouth and kisses back.

It feels so good. Dean’s hand in his, thumb smoothing over the back of his fingers; Sam’s mouth on his, exploring tirelessly.

“Mm,” Sam hums. “Wanted to do that for a while.”

Cas smiles, and he can feel himself blush. This whole hardened criminal thing isn’t really settling on him very well, he thinks with a huff of a laugh. “Me too,” he admits.

Dean kisses him, a quick peck to the cheek. “He was worried for us, Sammy. Wanted to make sure we were okay first. For a man who does what he wants...he’s slow.”

Cas can’t find it in himself to be offended. “I like to consider my options. I’m a planner.”

Sam kisses him again. “So, what’s the plan? You have two pretty hot guys in your bed, Cas.”

Dean arches an eyebrow at him and then looks down at Cas. “One _incredibly_ hot guy who knows exactly what you like, and one enormous moose who can’t get out of his own way.”

Sam snorts softly. “That’s not what you said last week.”

“No fighting before coffee,” Cas grouses. “Kiss me,” he tells Sam, and Dean chuckles as Sam leans in.

“Sure, you’ll do what _he_ tells you.” 

Cas squeezes his hand.

“Stop, stop,” Dean says, and they both pause in alarm.

“Take this off.” Dean tugs at the hem of his shirt, and Cas struggles out of it with a little help.

And then it all begins in earnest. What had started as an early morning distraction gets intense as Dean joins in, nibbling on Cas’s ear.

Sam seems to take that as a challenge and starts mouthing at Cas’s jaw, his neck, paying close attention to the dip just under his collar bone, one hand pressed hard at his hip.

It makes it hard to breathe, all this attention. There’s not an inch of his body that isn’t sparks and electricity. Dean’s hand has abandoned Cas’s and is now inching down his ribs, and if this follows previous experience, that hand is going to be sliding over his cock soon. 

The anticipation feels like it might kill him all on it’s own. He gasps, shallow little breaths that get pushed back out with every new sensation. 

It feels like drowning.

It feels _amazing_. 

“You okay, baby?” Dean murmurs, sliding up from where he’s been working.

Cas takes a shuddering breath. “Oh… _fuck_. It’s just...a lot.”

Sam’s mouth pauses abruptly on his nipple.

Cas nudges him back down, more suggestion than demand. “Don’t...don’t stop on my account.”

Dean’s laugh is dark. Warm. It promises a very good time.

They work on him together. Dean knows him well, knows every move that makes him shiver. And Cas knows exactly where each of Dean’s touches will lead, and it makes him hot all over. 

Sam is slower, more methodical. He’s learning what Cas likes, spontaneous but also studious as he explores. He uses the pads of his fingers to graze Cas’s skin—not quite light enough to be ticklish, not quite firm enough to give him relief—just enough to make him crazy for it. 

Both of them move inexorably down his body and anticipation makes him jump, his limbs suddenly not under his control. The brothers reach his hip bones at about the same time, tongues and teeth working there until he’s in a daze and can’t think beyond the feel of their mouths, the anticipation of what’s next.

He gasps when Dean slides his boxers down, just barely remembers how to help, and then there’s a hand inside his knee and Dean has him spread wide—vulnerable. 

Cas whimpers and Sam hums, and he’s not sure he’ll even make it to having them touch him. He might just come like this, with the promise of the two of them moving down in tandem.

“Shhh,” Dean whispers. “Easy,” he says, and Cas tries to focus on the sound of his voice, tries to let whatever’s coming happen. Slows his breathing, marginally. Contemplates baseball and realizes he knows nothing about it.

The kiss Dean presses into the hollow of his hip is drawn out, grounding. More affection than seduction.

Sam is still working. His fingers run slow lines against the V shape of Cas’s hip cuts—a fascination the brothers apparently have in common. 

Cas smiles slowly at the thought, and then he’s abruptly offline again when Dean’s mouth lands in the crease of his thigh and moves inexorably toward Cas’s cock, now fully at attention and aching.

“Look at you,” Sam breathes, a note of awe in his voice. “Like that?” he asks when Cas’s breath hitches again. 

If Cas could articulate anything in the moment, he might try to say something smart. As it is, he just managed some sort of high pitched cross between a grunt and a whine.

“I think he does,” Dean offers, and this might be the only downside to having the two of them working on him together. The quips. The teasing. The long drawn out—

“Oh, oh _fuck_ ,” he gasps, arching up as both of their mouths touch him at the same time, one hot on the shaft of his cock, the other licking his scrotum with broad, wet strokes.

Cas grabs the covers on either side of him and tries not go completely airborne as they work together, one finally moving up to take his cock in their mouth, working their tongue underneath and Jesus fucking _fuck_ , he’s going to explode. He’s going to die, right here. Right now. 

The vibrations of Dean’s low laughter make him whine and squirm, and then they hold him down as if they’ve planned it, letting his cock slide between their kissing lips, swiping him with wet tongues as his cock presses through the heat of their joined mouths. He doesn’t mean to thrust, doesn’t want to take, but he can’t help it. 

The way they touch him forces his hips to jerk forward, someone’s cupping his scrotum, someone’s got a tight grip at the base of his dick and those mouths, fuck, those hungry mouths are more than he can take, and then one of them slides down again, hot and perfect around him. The gentle suction slides off, and there’s a shock of cold before the other’s mouth takes over and they take turns sucking him off in uniquely mind blowing ways, different pressure and shapes and techniques, different but equally as intense and he’s lost his rhythm, lost his mind.

“I’m gonna,” he manages, “ _fuck_ , I’m coming,” he warns, hips pistoning frantically, and whatever mouth is on him just swallows, swallows, swallows as he comes with a pitiful cry.

When he finally remembers how to open his eyes, he looks down to find Sam and Dean kissing again, mouths wide and messy. Dean’s hand sits intimately inside Cas’s thigh, and there’s come dripping from the corner of Sam’s mouth.

Dean licks it away while Cas watches, and dear God, if he were ten years younger, that might’ve been another orgasm.

It takes some time for them to look back at him, but it doesn’t occur to Cas to mind—not when he can watch them like this—so intimate and gentle. He can see them vying for power, angle shifts and quick bites, but he’s not even sure if they know they’re doing it. It might just be an extension of how they are with each other.

Dean turns to Cas as Sam works along his neck. “You want us…?” He gestures at Cas’s chest and gives a single loose gesture.

Cas goes hot. He wouldn’t ask for it. Not with something so new. But now that Dean has put the idea in his head, he has to have it. His dick tries valiantly to rally.

He nods, trying not to look as excited and terrified as he feels.

“Sammy,” Dean whispers. “C’mere.” He manhandles Sam around so he’s straddling Cas’s thighs on his hands and knees, and then Dean pulls Sam’s cock out of his shorts, half hard and already long, nearly touching Cas’s stomach. “He’s gonna love this.” he tells Sam. “Wait til you see.”

Sam smiles up at Cas as Dean moves behind him again and starts to move, sliding against Sam in a lewd display, and Cas can’t look away.

Dean pulls at Sam’s cock, and Sam’s mouth goes open, slack, air pushing from his lungs, dragging back in. His head drops sometimes when Dean touches him just right, and Cas groans with him.

It’s unreal, watching them, Dean pressing against Sam’s ass, pushing him forward into Dean’s hand, Sam breathing hard and ragged, sometimes dipping low enough that the wet head of his cock touches Cas’s stomach, and they suck in a collective breath with the sensation of it.

It feesl like it goes on forever—the rutting, Sam’s face close enough to touch, his dick huge and impressive and getting more and more swollen with every second. 

“Sammy,” Dean finally says, voice low and harsh. “You got it?”

“Yeah,” Sam assures, reaching up and sitting back to grip his cock. “Yeah - _fuck_ \- I got it.” He strokes himself slowly, huge red head slick as it breaches the clench of his fist.

Dean moves around to Cas’s side, and he’s doing the same, stroking himself fast, breathing hard. He reaches out to touch Cas’s ribs as he works his hand, slick and loud in the quiet room.

Sam goes first, leaning forward with a groan, fist a blur. “Fuck, oh, _fuck_ , Cas, shit, God, _uh—_ ” His come falls, hot like a brand on Cas’s skin. They both groan as it lands and Cas bucks up to meet each spurt. He’s euphoric with the sensation, the animal noises, the primal feeling that rises in him.

Dean goes next, just as Sam is beginning to unclench, comes with a massive thrust of his hips, lets himself fall over Cas completely, holds himself up with one hand and gives Cas a first rate view of his hand and the arc of his come, over and over, striping sideways across Sam’s where it’s already cooling. Cas doesn’t come, but he might as well have. His body jerks with every fresh mark. He groans and his breath stutters and God it feels amazing.

“Holy shit,” Sam says, collapsing down next to him. “That was really hot.”

Another aftershock runs through Cas’s body as he nods.

Dean swipes a hand over Cas’s stomach to smooth the come over his skin. Cas tries not to give away how hot that makes him.

But Dean _knows_. Dean knows everything, and loves him anyway, and Cas is overcome with gratitude and comfort. As much as absolutely everything has changed, this hasn’t. Dean still knows him. Loves him. Does things just to make Cas happy.

Dean kisses his hip, one of the few places not currently covered in come, and then jumps off the bed before Cas can begin to articulate his feelings.

Cas turns toward Sam and smiles shyly. Sam touches his face. “Good?” he asks.

Cas smiles. “Yes, Sam. Perfect. Thank you.”

Sam’s smile takes up his whole face. “Thank you.”

They’re still kissing when Dean gets back with the washcloth. “No round two, kids. We gotta get on the road. C’mere, Cas,” and he shoves Sam away gently to wipe Cas clean.

“How ‘bout you, Pigpen? You need a cleanup?”

Sam rolls his eyes, but his smile is still wide. “Nope, got it all right where I wanted it.” He looks over at Cas, who blushes.

They pull on clothes slowly as Dean returns the washcloth and then pours the coffee.

“Come and get it,” he tells them. He sounds strict, as if he’s somehow withholding something by not handing the cups over to the bed. Cas kisses Dean’s neck as he grabs Sam’s cup and passes it back, and then his own.

“Thank you,” he says softly. “You’re wonderful.”

Dean scoffs, just like always. “Shut up. Just made it for me, y’all are caffeine collateral.”

Sam is packing up their duffels and Dean is closing up the coffee they brought from home, so Cas checks under the beds and in the drawers to make sure they don’t leave anything behind.

It’s crazy. Everything about this trip is crazy. Everything about this routine and how easily they’ve settled into it is absolutely insane.

But Cas feels free. He feels content. He looks at Dean and he doesn’t remember ever loving him more than he loves him right now. And a moment later, he feels the same. 

He looks at Sam, and he wonders how he lived so long never knowing him—how important he is to Dean, how perfectly he fits into what the two of them had.

Dean slings an arm around him as he gets up from checking the plug behind the nightstand. “Ready to go?”

He nods and they move toward the door. Sam kisses them both before he swings the door open and they step into the early morning sunlight together, ready to face whatever comes their way.

It feels like Cas has been waiting for this moment his whole life.


End file.
